In person Major Whistler was of medium size and well made. His face showed the finest type of manly beauty, combined with a delicacy almost feminine. In private life he was greatly prized for his natural qualities of heart and mind, his regard for the feelings of others, and his unvarying kindness, especially toward his inferiors and his young assistants. His duties and his travels in this and in other countries brought him in contact with men of every rank; and it is safe to say that the more competent those who knew him were to judge, the more highly was he valued by them. A close observer, with a keen sense of humor and unfailing tact, fond of personal anecdote, and with a mind stored with recollections from association with every grade of society, he was a most engaging companion. The charm of his manner was not conventional, nor due to intercourse with refined society, but came from a sense of delicacy and a refinement of feeling which was innate, and which showed itself in him under all circumstances. He was in the widest and best sense of the word a gentleman; and he was a gentleman outwardly because he was a gentleman at heart.
As an engineer, Whistler's works speak for him. He was eminently a practical man, remarkable for steadiness of judgment and for sound business sense. Whatever he did was so well done that he was naturally followed as a model by those who were seeking a high standard. Others may have excelled in extraordinary boldness or in some remarkable specialty, but in all that rounds out the perfect engineer, whether natural characteristics, professional training, or the well digested results of long and valuable experience, we look in vain for his superior, and those who knew him best will hesitate to acknowledge his equal.--_Journal of the Association of Engineering Societies_.
PRINTING LANTERN PICTURES BY ARTIFICIAL LIGHT ON BROMIDE PLATES FROM VARIOUS SIZES.
[Footnote: Read before the Birmingham Photographic Society. Reported in the _Photo. News_.]
There can be no question that there is no plan that is so simple for producing transparencies as contact printing, but in this, as in other photographic matters, one method of work will not answer all needs. Reproduction in the camera, using daylight to illuminate the negative, enables the operator to reduce or enlarge in every direction, but the lantern is a winter instrument, and comes in for demand and use during the short days. When even the professional photographer has not enough light to get through his orders, how can the amateur get the needed daylight if photography be only the pursuit in spare time? Besides, there are days in our large towns when what daylight there is is so yellow from smoke or fog as to have little actinic power. These considerations and needs have led me to experiment and test what can be done with artificial light, and I think I have made the way clear for actual work without further experiment. I have not been able by any arrangement of reflected light to get power enough to print negatives of the ordinary density, and have only succeeded by causing the light to be equally dispersed over the negative by a lens as used in the optical lantern, but the arrangements required are somewhat different to that of the enlarging lantern.